Tracing Routes

Wes Anderson's Darjeeling Limited follows three estranged brothers on a spiritual journey.

by Shaun Brady

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COACH ME IF YOU CAN: Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman and Owen Wilson on their train to self-discovery. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

Yes, it's all there: the immaculately framed compositions, the obsessively detailed production design, the deep-cut British Invasion album tracks, a pouty Bill Murray. By now, in film five, Wes Anderson's familiar trademarks should be edging into self-parody, or at least starting to feel tired. But Anderson has proved adept at making those tropes feel, if not fresh, at least appropriate to tell his distinctive stories.

Perhaps in part the director can thank the raft of indie-cute filmmakers who have arisen in his wake, who employ many of his techniques in more gimmicky fashion. None has managed to capture the sense of melancholy that saturates Anderson's work.

Especially given Anjelica Huston's presence as a loving but distant mother, The Darjeeling Limited feels something like a step-sequel to The Royal Tenenbaums, Anderson's prior foray into sibling friction. That sense is bolstered by the absent father figure, unseen but represented by symbols of his immense ego and borderline-unhealthy influence on his three sons. It's impossible not to picture Gene Hackman in the role as the trio reminisce.

The middle of three brothers himself, Anderson is particularly skilled at portraying sibling dynamics, and even subtracting his usual playfulness it's easy to picture these three as children: Owen Wilson, the controlling eldest; Adrien Brody, the middle child desperate to prove his independence; and Jason Schwartzman, the sensitive youngest, easily hurt and eager to play peacemaker.

Those roles get played out under the microscope as the three set out on a train across India, reuniting a year after their father's funeral for some vaguely defined "spiritual journey" dreamed up by Wilson. The film's first half allows Wilson's camera to float whimsically through the train, observing a comedy of errors play out.

It would be easy to play the misguided trio's travails for cheap ugly-American humor, and while there certainly are traces of that, Anderson resists joking at the expense of his characters. They're self-absorbed, but ultimately, the film seems to suggest, aren't we all? They've set out on this quest to work out their own issues, and that seems obstacle enough to overcome. Everything they learn en route can impact them only on that level.

Wilson's presence is especially revelatory in that regard, and exemplifies Anderson's keen ability to trade on his audience's familiarity with his stock company. His head swathed in bandages, Wilson is in physical pain that's echoed in his exhausted temperament. It's particularly poignant given the actor's own real-life troubles; but even without that meta-level, the performance complements his role as Dignan in Anderson's debut, Bottle Rocket. Wilson has given countless iterations of the same overambitious, underequipped dreamer since then, but here, even given the screwball mission he's embarked upon, he seems resigned to failure. The laminated itineraries and half-baked rituals seem pathetic, and every disappointment seems dangerous, especially given the revelation regarding the cause of his injuries.

Schwartzman, of course, inevitably conjures memories of Rushmore's Max Fischer, and again, this could be the same character a decade down the line, having been faced with some harsh realities. In introducing Brody into the fold, Anderson underlines his character's desire to remain apart from his brothers, to carve out a new identity.

When the brothers finally step off the train, though, the film takes on some of the ragged looseness of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, often becoming disorienting and abrupt. Their histories brought to the point of (comical) physical confrontation by the close quarters of their cabin, everything spills out once they're forced literally off the rails and to give up their detailed agendas for actual spontaneity. A sudden tragedy knocks the brothers' trajectory off-kilter, introduced with a sudden, skewed zoom that shatters the film's pristine formality.

"We haven't located us yet," Wilson repeats after the train goes off course and the engineer has trouble locating their position on a map. The symbolism of the statement inspires him, and Darjeeling is full of such literal metaphor. The most egregious, though charmingly deployed, is the omnipresence of the father's baggage, in both senses of the word, which finally has to be literally disposed of.

Anderson has been criticized in the past for creating a New York as lily-white and even less realistic than Woody Allen's, and his India, scored as it may be by music from the films of Satyajit Ray, is unwaveringly seen through the eyes of these Caucasian outsiders. But that, essentially, is the point: It's very otherness provides the interest for these navel-gazing adventurers, too busy with understanding loved ones they've known a lifetime to even try to understand a whole other culture.

(s_brady@citypaper.net)

The Darjeeling Limited

Directed by Wes Anderson, A Fox Searchlight Pictures release